Linux Tweaks, HowTo's and Reviews

Back before the Christmas Holidays, I purchased the Sabrent 68 in 1 USB 2.0 Internal Card Reader/Writer from NewEgg. It was the Shell Shocker deal of the day with a cut rate price and free shipping. It was less than $10, so I figured I'd give it a try. I was ordering some Christmas gifts anyway, so this item wasn't really the focus of my order.

A couple of weeks ago I finally got around to installing it in my main desktop computer. Installation was simple enough. It fits into a standard 3.5" bay, (you know, the size of those archaic diskette drives). Well, I actually have a diskette drive, but since my case has two 3.5" bays, it was no big deal. The box contained only the card reader wrapped in bubble wrap and a small bag with four screws for installation. I screwed the card reader into my case and plugged the cable into an open USB header on the motherboard. That was it. I put the side panel back on the computer case, hooked all the cords back up to the back panel and booted up.

The card reader was automatically recognized by Ubuntu. I can't claim to have tested every kind of card in it, I can tell you that it works fine with Memory Stick and SD cards. It also has a USB port on it, so that's a nice addition. Who couldn't use an extra USB port on the front of their computer?

An interesting thing to note is that this card reader somehow resolved the issue I'd been having with a lack of automatic detection of USB drives plugged into the built-in hub on my HP w2207 flat panel monitor.

OS Support
The specs on the box list support for the following operating systems: Windows 98/98se/ME/2000/XP/Vista, Mac OS 10.1.2 or later, and Linux kernel 2.4.0 or later. That's right, they actually tested and certified compatibility with Linux!

I've got to hand it to Sabrent. Rarely does one find a piece of computer hardware that actually lists Linux compatibility on the packaging. Usually I have to scrounge through online forums to figure out if there are drivers available or not.